Elena Alvarez
'''Elena Alvarez' is a central character in the original Netflix series One Day at a Time. She is portrayed by Isabella Gomez. Bio Elena Maria Alvarez Riera Calderón Leyte-Vidal Inclán, was born August 7, 2001 to Penelope and Victor Alvarez. About a month after she was born, the 9/11 terrorist attacks occurred, prompting her parents to reenlist in the army. Around 2003 or 2004, her little brother Alex was born (to which Elena was not pleased about because she wanted a puppy). While in the army, Penelope came back with a bum shoulder, but her father was left with PTSD. Without doing anything to treat it, Victor became a heavy drinker, and attempted suicide at one point. This caused her parents' to separate, leaving Elena and Alex to live with their mother and maternal grandmother Lydia. Penelope describes Elena as someone who "always stands up for herself." '' She's captain of the debate team and she has a love for social studies. She is shown as a quirky teen who is still finding herself. She does not have many friends but her best friend Carmen is a huge part of her life. In ''Strays, Penelope suggests that Elena doesn't have any friends outside of the internet. Though it's an ongoing joke in the first half of season one, Elena expresses the possibility of liking girls in Hold, Please. Her grandmother even suspects that her relationship with Carmen might be "queer." She officially comes out as a lesbian, in Sex Talk. All of her family accepts her sexuality, except for her father, Victor. He walked out on her, during her quinces, when the father-daughter dance was starting. She is currently dating Syd. She has a very loving relationship with her family, mother Penelope Alvarez, and brother Alex Alvarez, and although she loves her grandmother, Lydia Riera, there is some level of disagreement due to different beliefs. Lydia thinks her political concerns and crusades are annoying. Although her relationship with her father, Victor Alvarez, is unknown prior to the series, it was likely that they were close and loving, though his gift of a doll upon his return from Afghanistan and her admission that they don't have a lot in common suggests that there is now a disconnect between them. When she came out as a lesbian, this caused a strain in their relationship, until Victor eventually learned from Alex to accept and love her apologizing for the pain he caused her. She is reluctant, but accepts his apology. Relationships Family Penelope Alvarez Mother They didn't get along so well in the beginning of the series, because her mother wanted her to have a quinceañera, but Elena didn't want one; as she thought they were a sexist tradition. But Elena decides to do it, if it will make her mom happy. Although they were close, her mother still tends to have rules for Elena. Penelope used to have a rule, that while she is in high school, Elena wasn't allowed to date because she needed to study for school. When she learned Elena had Josh Flores over, without her permission, she got very angry. Penelope's overprotective instincts made her worry, that Elena might have been pressured into having sex with Josh. However, Elena assures Penelope that she wasn't having sex with him. She soon came out to her mother as gay, and that she only liked Josh as a friend. Penelope feels weird about Elena being gay at first, but she never held any prejudice towards her. She eventually learns to completely accept her daughter as gay. She even lifts the no-dating rule and allows Elena to start dating Syd, but she still monitors them and makes sure they aren't doing anything inappropriate in Elena's bedroom. When Elena's father learns that Elena is gay and starts being bigoted towards her, Penelope is the one to stand up for Elena. In the end, she helps Elena and Victor to start talking, and rekindle their relationship. Penelope tries to be a better role model for Elena, supporting her daughter when it comes to her sexuality, or what she wants to do in life. No matter what, Penelope will always love Elena. Alex Alvarez Younger Brother .]] When Alex was born, Elena was not happy because she wanted a puppy. However, in the present day, she loves her little brother. Even though they often annoy each other, they know they still love each other, even if Elena and Alex don't have much in common. Alex gets easily annoyed, by Elena's social justice and environmental activism, and often finds it embarrassing. Sometimes, he will do little things like waste water, to spite her. However, when Alex accidentally overhears Elena talking to herself about how she likes girls, Alex promises he won't tell anyone. This makes Alex the first person Elena came out to. Although he is a little confused at first, about his sister liking other girls, he still doesn't care who she likes to date. Lydia Riera '''Maternal Grandmother' Lydia is Elena's maternal grandmother who she lives with. Lydia and Elena have a good relationship, but they often get on each other's nerves. Lydia often shows favoritism to Alex over Elena, to where she constantly compliments Alex but always criticizes Elena in things like her appearance and non-traditional values. Elena often corrects her grandmother when she says she something problematic. However, Elena's passion for feminism and social justice often annoys Lydia, who is more conservative. When Elena comes out to Lydia, Lydia says she thinks it's beautiful and completely accepts her, but when she is alone with Penelope, she admits she has a problem with Elena being gay. But then she remembers the Pope said when it comes to gay people, who is he to judge them? Which prompts her to accept Elena being gay. In To Zir, With Love, Lydia even helps Elena get a girlfriend by giving her love advice. Elena is often concerned about Lydia. In Roots, she is afraid that Lydia might be sent back to Cuba if she doesn't become an American citizen and convinces her to take the citizenship test. In Benefit with Friends, Elena worries about Lydia's health and bans her from wearing high heels and doing strenuous activity. However, Lydia wants to continue wearing high heels and dancing because she doesn't want to remember who she was, she wants to be who she is. She eventually agrees to wear safer shoes for Elena's sake. When it comes to it, Lydia is always there to support Elena. In A Penny and a Nicole, She was ready to 'flip the table' if Victor he said anything homophobic to her. In Outside, when Elena says some guys were harassing her and Syd, she says she will "kill" the guys in Alex's place so he doesn't get his hands bloody. Victor Alvarez Father Elena and Victor didn't really have much in common. Whenever they video chat, they just stare at each other until the screen froze. When Elena came out as gay, just before Elena's quinceañera, Victor did not accept her. He told her that he didn't know what she was talking about because she was too young and that being gay is just a crazy phase that kids think is cool to do. When he say Elena came out in a suit at her quinceañera, Victor looked very angry. When's it's time for the father-daughter dance, it's revealed that he left. So, her family comes and dances with her instead. In Season 2, Elena and Victor are not on good terms. Elena is very frustrated that Victor abandoned her. In What Happened, Elena and Penelope learn that Victor is in town, so Penelope and Elena have a teary-eyed conversation with him, and they end up sort of making up and go back to talking again. In Season 3, when Elena learns that her father is coming with his new girlfriend, she is apprehensive about seeing him. She still feels weird about him even if they made up. When she learns he is getting married to his girlfriend and she goes to his wedding she laments that she has to be nice and be there for him on his big day even though he wasn't there's for her on her quinces. Schneider Close friend; landlord Schneider is often there's for Elena. Even though Elena thinks he is annoying and is a privileged rich guy, she enjoys his company. He helps her when she needed a job, and was her intern for the Twitch channel she tried to start up. When the Twitch channel didn't work out, he trains her to be a handy-woman for the apartment. Schneider is also the biggest shipper of Elena and Syd, as he tries very hard to come up with a relationship name for them. Carmen Best friends Carmen is one of Elena's best friends during Season 1. In No Mass, Carmen and Elena spend the day together working on an immigration project. In Strays, they seem to be very close and Penelope becomes very suspicious of their relationship. Lydia even suggests their relationship is "queer." When Penelope tries to make Carmen go home, Elena gets very upset. Later, when Penelope catches Carmen trying to sneak back into the house, Penelope makes Elena explain. We learn that Elena has been sneaking Carmen into the apartment and secretly living in Elena's room. The reason is that Carmen's parents were deported back to Mexico and she didn't know what to do. Elena truly cared for her friend and didn't want her to leave, which is why she kept it a secret so her mom didn't kick her out. When Carmen goes to move to Texas where her older brother lives, Elena and Carmen say goodbye and leave. In Pride & Prejudice, Carmen praises Penelope for being so cool about Elena coming out as gay over video chat. In Quinces, Schneider flew Carmen out to be there for Elena's quinces. Carmen is not seen in Season 2 or Season 3. Syd Significant other, (or "Syd-nificant other") For more info, visit the Elena and Syd page. Elena first meets Syd in ''To Zir, With Love'' when she began her Feminists Gamers of Echo Park group. Syd reveals that they like Elena and they begin dating. They go on their first date in ''Locked Down''. They are super similar in the sense that they are both very passionate about feminism and social justice, but Elena is more into it than Syd is. When Elena only wanted to do protests and social justice causes as dates instead of a normal date, Syd had their first fight with Elena, because they wanted to go to Benihana, but Elena wouldn't listen to them. In The First Time, Syd and Elena plan to have sex for the first time and rent a hotel room together. But Syd calms Elena when she starts to freak out a secret says that don't have to have sex yet if she isn't ready. However, Elena begins making out with them, then offscreen, they end up having sex with each other. Trivia * She is the only member of her family who didn't speak Spanish, only knowing English, until she later asked Lydia Riera, her grandmother, to teach her in season two, becoming bilingual. **It is revealed in Not Yet, that Elena stopped speaking Spanish when she was a child and Lydia yelled at her for messing up her outfit in Spanish. Elena stopped listening to her, and over time lost her Spanish. Lydia worried that she lost her "cubanidad" (the state of being Cuban). * She is the first LGBT+ character to come out on the show that is not an adult. * When she came out as a lesbian to her father in Quinces, he rejected her, telling her it wasn't who she was which caused her to realize that people would hate her just because she's a lesbian, before knowing anything else about her. * It is highly likely that Penelope Alvarez fears for Elena's safety as a lesbian teenager, stating that her house is "the last place that should have a gun," noting that they had two teenagers in the house and mentioning Elena's sexuality, pointing to the risk of suicide among LGBT+ youth. * According to Penelope Alvarez, if she got "bent out of shape" every time a man said something stupid, Elena would've never been born. * She is a teenage activist, participating in marches and political events. * Elena's laptop cover changes from saying "Peace & Love" in season one to a shimmery rainbow in season 2. * She refers to her significant other, Syd as her "Syd-nificant other" instead of a gendered term because they're non-binary. Physical Appearance Elena is a young Latinx female. She has long black hair that goes to down her shoulders, that she's occasionally wear in a bun, ponytail, or braid. She is usually wearing thick black glasses. She doesn’t like to wear makeup. She wears casual clothing, such as t-shirts, sweaters, flannel, jeans. She doesn’t like to wear overtly feminine clothing. At formal events, she prefers to wear suits and a tie instead of a dress. After she came out, she began to wear the male uniform at her school, with pants instead of a skirt. She is 5'3 and has a slim build. She has paler skin than her brother that has been described as "Wonder Bread." She is nicknamed Blanquita and discovers people perceive her as white in ''The Turn''. Photos :Elena Alvarez/Gallery Notes and references Videos Category:ODAAT Category:Season 1 Category:Season 2 Category:Season 3 Category:Characters Category:Main Characters Category:Female Characters Category:LGBTQ Characters